Minimalist dragon line drawing

The man who came into the shop on Tuesday would not give his name, only the price of a single sheet of Dutch paper and a bottle of walnut ink. He sat at the end of the counter where the light from the harbour window falls, and he drew without lifting the nib once. I timed it by the church clock across the road. It took eleven minutes, and the thing that came out of it looked like a wire somebody had bent into a question.

It was a dragon, if you can call it that. A long neck rose out of the page like a river finding its level, a head with one surprised eyebrow, and a tail that ended in a curl so tight it seemed to be listening for something. Five spines ran back from its shoulder, thin as the pins Mrs Aske uses for hemming. He said the trick was never to think about where the line would end. Mother always said the same about knitting, and I told him so, and he laughed at that more than I expected.

When he left he forgot the paper. I have it pinned above the sorting table. Yesterday the tide came up over the slipway, and a boy from the rope works asked whether the creature was flying or swimming. I found I could not answer him, which is perhaps the point of it.

I am folding the drawing into this letter so you can take it to the printers in Leeds. Tell them it is not for sale. Tell them I have started copying it, and that my hand keeps wanting to finish the tail before the body is done.